Word: vaticans
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...past 10 years - speculation about his successor ratchets up another notch. So when the Pope was rushed to the hospital last week suffering from an inflamed windpipe, spasms of the larynx and the flu, people wondered how long he would be able to continue in office. The Vatican reported that John Paul was making a good recovery, but with the 84-year-old Pontiff increasingly debilitated by Parkinson's disease, some are asking a more immediate question: Who's running the church? Despite his physical frailty, Vatican officials say John Paul is still mentally alert and capable of making...
...Around midnight, Navarro-Valls, who is a medical doctor, confirmed that there were complications to the flu and the pope had suffered acute laryngeal tracheitis and experienced a "larynx spasm crisis," a clinical way to say he'd had difficulty breathing. The cynical among the Vatican press corps believed that the "flu" that had been reported in the official bulletins was in fact a cover for something much worse. Sources at the Vatican discount that scenario, noting both the Pope's relatively robust appearance Sunday and the fact that the basic details about his condition were being released at regular...
...together" said the Vatican official. "The papal apartment is equipped to respond to respiratory problems. He's had trouble breathing other times in the past. This was obviously more serious." But rather rapidly the Pope's condition appears to have stablized. On Wednesday morning, he held Mass from his hospital bed after a light breakfast and coffee. And Navarro-Valls told reporters jammed in the Gemelli lobby: "There is no cause for alarm...
...ability to preach to his followers. What were once 17-hour papal work days are now a fraction of that with the Pope confined to a wheelchair and in need of ever more rest. Talk of retirement that surfaced three years ago has effectively been stifled, leaving Vatican observers with a nagging question: Who is really running the show at the Holy See? Rome's influential Cardinals no doubt are having their say. Conservative German stalwart Joseph Ratzinger who heads the office that oversees all moral and theological issues and Secretary of State Angelo Sodano whose role is traditionally that...
...That will be done by the some 120 Cardinals under 80 years of age, who will vote in a secret, closed-door Conclave for the next Pope whenever John Paul's health does eventually fail him. Ratzinger has recently re-emerged as the top papal candidate from within the Vatican hierarchy, joining other front runners such as Dionigi Tettamanzi of Milan and Claudio Hummes of Sao Paolo. Vatican sources have told TIME that the length of the current papacy - now more than 26 years - may prompt the Cardinals to seek a shorter-term "transitional" figure. Ratzinger, 77, may fill that...